1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a compartmented and insulated food storage container, including heated and chilled compartments. Both heated and chilled foods may be contained therein, and their respective disparate temperatures are maintained simultaneously.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It has long been the goal of the prior art to store in a container foods which must be preserved by chilling, and other foods which must be heated.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,286,440, issued to Frank Taylor on Sep. 1, 1981, describes a portable cooler for holding at least two classes of chilled comestibles. The cooler is built so as to describe separate storage chambers which are separated when a chilled medium is set in place. The walls of one or both chambers accommodate the chilled medium, which is preferably a solid walled receptacle containing ice or a similar medium which has previously been considerably chilled. The receptacles form a final wall separating one chilled chamber from another. The purpose of this arrangement is to maintain a first comestible at a lower temperature than a comestible stored in the second chamber. In an example, beverages are maintained at about 40 degrees Fahrenheit, and wrapped sandwiches are maintained at 60 degrees Fahrenheit.
A compartmented lunch box is seen in U.S. Pat. No. 5,181,612, issued to Yuan W. Liu on Jan. 26, 1993. The interior of the basically cubical or rectangular box is partitioned into two chambers. A wall is placed within the cubical or rectangular storage chamber at a selectively variable point therein, the wall being parallel to the end walls of the box. The resultant subchambers thus share two dimensions. The third dimension may differ or be equal. Both subchambers are accessible from the top.
A highly insulated carrying box is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,040,678, issued to Voigt O. Lenmark, Sr., et al. on Aug. 20, 1991. The receptacle is virtually filled with blocks of expanded foam or like materials. Spaces between adjacent blocks accommodate specimen vials. A chilled medium is also carried within the box. The vials are both protected from shock and insulated by the blocks. Mechanical protection is a primary objective of this invention, and economy of space is not important.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,974,426, issued to Sergio G. Gomez on Dec. 4, 1990, discloses a portable cooler primarily intended to transfer heat from a plurality of beverage containers, such as metal cylindrical cans, as efficiently as possible. The cooler includes a structure devoted to holding beverage containers for quick dispensing, and for promoting flow of water from melted ice stored within the cooler to these beverage containers. Although internal walls are shown inside the ice chamber, these internal walls hold cans in a preferred orientation, and do not subdivide the ice chamber into separated subchambers.
An insert system for a portable cooler is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,916,923, issued to Carol A. Adams et al. on Apr. 17, 1990. The insert holds a predetermined number of beverage containers upright within the cooler, and does not subdivide the cooler main chamber into separated subchambers.
A preferred heating medium is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,976,049, which is hereby incorporated by reference. The medium comprises iron, water, cellulose, vermiculite, activated carbon, and salt. In a commercially available form distributed by the Grabber Company, 205 Mason Circle, Concord, Calif., the contents are provided as a granular solid contained within a paper envelope. When a surrounding air impermeable wrapper is opened, an exothermic process proceeds, and the heating medium emits heat for at least twelve hours.
None of the above inventions and patents, taken either singly or in combination, is seen to describe the instant invention as claimed.